It is more than hypocrisy. It's an attack on memory. Gordon Brown, calling for the establishment of a special tribunal that would punish the Russian government, rightly points out that the act of aggression - the invasion of another country - was recognized by the Nuremberg Tribunal as "the greatest international crime". He wrote for "The Guardian" that not only Vladimir Putin should be prosecuted, but also his "servants". This includes Russian and possibly Belarusian members of the national security councils, and a number of political and military leaders. Everyone should bear responsibility for this "obviously illegal war", he wrote on his website.
Condoleezza Rice, who was George Bush's national security adviser, was asked during an appearance on Fox News: "When you attack a sovereign state, is that a war crime?". She replied: "It is certainly against all principles of international law and international order."
Brown and Rice are right about Russia. By invading Ukraine, her government has clearly committed the crime of aggression, a crime in which, as Brown points out, high officials are complicit. The same is true of the British and American governments, which invaded Iraq 20 years ago. Among the most prominent perpetrators were Rice and Brown.
The seventh Nuremberg principle, to which Brown refers in calling for the prosecution of the Russians, states that "complicity" in a war of aggression is "a crime under international law." Both of these officials clearly qualify as accomplices. Rice was one of the architects of the war. Brown, as a member of the government, was the deciding factor. As finance minister, he financed the war.
No one can reasonably deny that the invasion of Iraq fits the Nuremberg definition. The Chilcot Inquiry, whose terms of reference were set by Brown when he was Prime Minister, was forbidden to rule on the legality of the war. But she concluded that “the United Kingdom joined the invasion before peaceful disarmament options had been exhausted. Military action was not the last option at that moment". In other words, the criteria of the UN Charter for legal warfare have not been met. The former justice minister, Lord Steyn, came to the same conclusion: in the absence of a second UN resolution authorizing the war, it was illegal". The former chief justice, Lord Bingham, called the war in Iraq "a serious breach of international law". A Dutch investigation, led by a former supreme court judge, found that the invasion "was not grounded in international law."
The attackers went out of their way to eliminate peaceful alternatives. Saddam Hussein tried desperately to negotiate, eventually offering everything the US and Britain claimed they wanted, but they turned him down, and then lied to us about it. When the UN sought diplomatic solutions, US officials went into what they called "prevention mode", sabotaging the negotiations.
When the head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, Jose Bustani, offered to resolve the impasse over weapons inspections in Iraq, the US government illegally removed him. The first government to support his removal was the British government.
The government in which Brown was a minister was repeatedly warned that the planned invasion would be illegal. A year before the war, the head of diplomacy at the time, Jack Straw, explained what is necessary for a war to be legal, 1) there must be an armed attack on a country or such an attack must be certain, 2) the use of force must be necessary, and other means to attack prevention/avoidance must be unavailable; 3) self-defense must be proportionate and strictly limited to the goal of preventing an attack". None of these conditions were valid. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to Deputy Legal Adviser Elizabeth Wilshurst, has repeatedly warned that the invasion will be illegal without a new UN resolution. She explained that "the illegal use of force on such a scale is a crime of aggression". The document warns the government: "Legal justification of the invasion would be necessary." Judging by the advice of the Legal Service, it currently does not exist".
Regarding legal advice, the then Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, warned that there were only three ways in which an invasion could be legally justified. These are self-defense, humanitarian intervention, or UNSC (UN Security Council approval). The first and second in this case could not serve as a basis". The government failed to get the approval of the UN Security Council. During the Chilcot Inquiry Lord Goldsmith testified that, after giving advice that Tony Blair did not want to hear, the Prime Minister stopped asking for advice. Just before the war, although the facts had not changed, Goldsmith changed his mind.
There is another term for a “crime of aggression”: an act of mass murder. Hundreds of thousands of people died in the invasion of Iraq. We cannot be more precise than that, since the invading forces refused to measure the extent of the carnage. But it is almost certainly the greatest crime against humanity of this century so far. Blair, Brown, Bush and Rice are guilty of a "manifestly illegal war", as is Putin and his close advisers.
However, who gets prosecuted is a matter of victor's justice. For example, while a warrant was not issued last week on yet another charge of arresting Putin and one of his officials, 31 cases were brought before the International Criminal Court. Each of the defendants in those cases is African. Is it because Africa is the only continent where crimes against humanity occur? No. This is because Africans accused of such crimes do not enjoy the political protection afforded by Western leaders who commit even greater atrocities.
Instead of facing justice, murderers walk among us, respected, respected, treated as respectable statesmen to whom the media and governments turn for advice. Braun can be seen as a great humanitarian. Alistair Campbell, who oversaw the compilation of the "deceptive dossier" that provided a false pretext for war, and is therefore as complicit as any of Putin's "henchmen", has been thoroughly "washed": in other words, he has been rehabilitated like other shadowy political figures, from foreign television.
There was no settling of accounts and there will be none. This greatest of crimes is so thoroughly "washed" that its perpetrators can call themselves angels who avenge other people's crimes. To quote King Lear: “Clothe sin with gold, and mighty justice's spear shall break; and dress him in rags, and he will be pierced by a dwarf's straw".
The text is taken from "The Guardian"
Translation: N. Bogetić
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